Things are good!!

At the end of September 2012, I emailed my support group:

Whew, what a day!

It started with me oversleeping and having to race out of the house to get to my appointment with the psychiatrist. This was a follow-up appointment and it went really well. After a somewhat rocky start with nausea and two days in a row of migraines, I'm not only tolerating the zoloft well, but I'm beginning to reap the benefits of it, which are nothing short of amazing to me. The anxiety is pretty much gone; I've been sleeping better, without nightmares; I've felt much more optimistic; I seem better able to handle the emotional ups and downs of life. I know that I'm not yet experiencing the full effects but even now I feel so much more stable than I ever have.

On Monday, I started taking vyvanse, my new ADD med. It's been fairly amazing too. I knew I struggled a lot, but I had no idea how much. I went into the p-doc with a written list of all the improvements I'd noticed and he kept saying, "Your meds are working exactly the way they are supposed to." He started me on the lowest dose of vyvanse, so he upped it a little and also prescribed me a shorter acting med to take in the later afternoon right before the vyvanse starts wearing off.

I left feeling hugely encouraged.

Then I got home. My husband had taken the day off, and he and our two youngest boys were waiting for me, wanting to have a serious talk. Uh oh. Once I realized what they wanted to talk about, I actually felt somewhat relieved, because this conversation has been long overdue. I ended up explaining everything to them...that I had been raped in my early 20's...that I had PTSD and what that meant...why I have been seeing a therapist...that I had recently been tested and diagnosed with ADD...that I was on new meds...and then I let them ask any questions that they wanted to ask. We talked about all sorts of stuff, including my drinking (which has been way better, by the way...) The only thing I didn't tell them about is the incest. They had figured out some of the stuff on their own, just by living with me. (It's kinda obvious I have PTSD. Duh!) I apologized to both boys about not being more open with them, and we talked about my family's legacy of secrecy and how I am trying to overcome that. It was a great talk!! Randy would be so proud of us!

After that, we ate hamburgers and made all sorts of jokes about getting diagnosed with a variety of learning disorders and quirky syndromes so that we could have excuses for all our behaviors.

Then we did work around the house. My husband and I even tackled a project that, before the vyvanse, would have so overwhelmed me that I would have had a terrible meltdown. Instead, I worked away with him as if I was an almost normal person in a good mood! It was so shockingly different than the old me that we couldn't help commenting on it.

I slept fairly well last night.

This morning I keep thinking about all the positive changes in my life lately. Our marriage still needs work, but it is the best it has ever been. It looks like I've found the right meds for my PTSD and my ADD. Our family is becoming more and more connected and open...and a lot of healing is taking place. Good, good stuff! God is really working.

At the same time, it's kinda scary. But, then again, everything is kinda scary to me!